All the Light We Cannot See: A Novel

Marie-Laure lives with her father in Paris near the Museum of Natural History, where he works as the master of its thousands of locks. When she is six, Marie-Laure goes blind and her father builds a perfect miniature of their neighborhood so she can memorize it by touch and navigate her way home. When she is 12, the Nazis occupy Paris and father and daughter flee to the walled citadel of Saint-Malo, where Marie-Laure’s reclusive great-uncle lives in a tall house by the sea. With them they carry what might be the museum’s most valuable and dangerous jewel.

The Nightingale

Audie Award, Fiction, 2016. From the number-one New York Times bestselling author comes Kristin Hannah’s next novel. It is an epic love story and family drama set at the dawn of World War II. She is the author of twenty-one novels. Her previous novels include Home Front, Night Road, Firefly Lane, Fly Away, and Winter Garden.

A Man Called Ove

Meet Ove. He's a curmudgeon - the kind of man who points at people he dislikes as if they were burglars caught outside his bedroom window. He has staunch principles, strict routines, and a short fuse. People call him "the bitter neighbor from hell". But behind the cranky exterior there is a story and a sadness.

New York socialite Caroline Ferriday has her hands full with her post at the French consulate and a new love on the horizon. But Caroline's world is forever changed when Hitler's army invades Poland in September 1939 - and then sets its sights on France. An ocean away from Caroline, Kasia Kuzmerick, a Polish teenager, senses her carefree youth disappearing as she is drawn deeper into her role as courier for the underground resistance movement.

After a violent coup in the United States overthrows the Constitution and ushers in a new government regime, the Republic of Gilead imposes subservient roles on all women. Offred, now a Handmaid tasked with the singular role of procreation in the childless household of the enigmatic Commander and his bitter wife, can remember a time when she lived with her husband and daughter and had a job, before she lost everything, even her own name.

Before We Were Yours: A Novel

Memphis, 1939. Twelve-year-old Rill Foss and her four younger siblings live a magical life aboard their family's Mississippi River shantyboat. But when their father must rush their mother to the hospital one stormy night, Rill is left in charge - until strangers arrive in force. Wrenched from all that is familiar and thrown into a Tennessee Children's Home Society orphanage, the Foss children are assured that they will soon be returned to their parents - but they quickly realize the dark truth.

A single mother turns up dead at the bottom of the river that runs through town. Earlier in the summer, a vulnerable teenage girl met the same fate. They are not the first women lost to these dark waters, but their deaths disturb the river and its history, dredging up secrets long submerged. Left behind is a lonely 15-year-old girl. Parentless and friendless, she now finds herself in the care of her mother's sister, a fearful stranger who has been dragged back to the place she deliberately ran from - a place to which she vowed she'd never return.

Beneath a Scarlet Sky: A Novel

Pino Lella wants nothing to do with the war or the Nazis. He's a normal Italian teenager - obsessed with music, food, and girls - but his days of innocence are numbered. When his family home in Milan is destroyed by Allied bombs, Pino joins an underground railroad helping Jews escape over the Alps, and falls for Anna, a beautiful widow six years his senior. In an attempt to protect him, Pino's parents force him to enlist as a German soldier - a move they think will keep him out of combat.

Big Little Lies

Pirriwee Public's annual school Trivia Night has ended in a shocking riot. One parent is dead. The school principal is horrified. As police investigate what appears to have been a tragic accident, signs begin to indicate that this devastating death might have been cold-blooded murder. In this thought-provoking novel, number-one New York Times best-selling author Liane Moriarty deftly explores the reality of parenting and playground politics, ex-husbands and ex-wives, and fractured families.

The Glass Castle: A Memoir

Jeannette Walls grew up with parents whose ideals and stubborn nonconformity were both their curse and their salvation. Rex and Rose Mary Walls had four children. In the beginning, they lived like nomads, moving among Southwest desert towns, camping in the mountains. Rex was a charismatic, brilliant man who, when sober, captured his children's imagination. Rose Mary painted and wrote and couldn't stand the responsibility of providing for her family; she called herself an "excitement addict."

My Husband's Wife: A Novel

For fans of Big Little Lies and The Couple Next Door comes an addictive psychological thriller that's already an international sensation. When young lawyer Lily marries Ed, she's determined to make a fresh start. To leave the secrets of the past behind. But then she takes on her first murder case and meets Joe. A convicted murderer whom Lily is strangely drawn to. For whom she will soon be willing to risk almost anything.

Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine: A Novel

Meet Eleanor Oliphant: She struggles with appropriate social skills and tends to say exactly what she's thinking. Nothing is missing in her carefully timetabled life of avoiding social interactions, where weekends are punctuated by frozen pizza, vodka, and phone chats with Mummy. But everything changes when Eleanor meets Raymond, the bumbling and deeply unhygienic IT guy from her office.

Orphan Train: A Novel

Penobscot Indian Molly Ayer is close to "aging out" out of the foster care system. A community-service position helping an elderly woman clean out her home is the only thing keeping Molly out of juvie and worse.... As she helps Vivian sort through her possessions and memories, Molly learns that she and Vivian aren’t as different as they seem to be. A young Irish immigrant orphaned in New York City, Vivian was put on a train to the Midwest with hundreds of other children whose destinies would be determined by luck and chance.

What Alice Forgot

What would happen if you were visited by your younger self, and got a chance for a do-over?Alice Love is twenty-nine years old, madly in love with her husband, and pregnant with their first child. So imagine her surprise when, after a fall, she comes to on the floor of a gym (a gym! she HATES the gym!) and discovers that she's actually thirty-nine, has three children, and is in the midst of an acrimonious divorce.

Me Before You: A Novel

Louisa Clark is an ordinary girl living an exceedingly ordinary life - steady boyfriend, close family - who has never been farther afield than her tiny village. She takes a badly needed job working for ex-Master of the Universe Will Traynor, who is wheelchair bound after an accident. Will has always lived a huge life - big deals, extreme sports, worldwide travel - and now he's pretty sure he cannot live the way he is. Will is acerbic, moody, bossy - but Lou refuses to treat him with kid gloves, and soon his happiness means more to her than she expected.

The Zookeeper's Wife: A War Story

When Germany invaded Poland, bombers devastated Warsaw - and the city's zoo along with it. With most of their animals dead, zookeepers Jan and Antonina Zabinski began smuggling Jews into the empty cages. Another dozen "guests" hid inside the Zabinskis' villa, emerging after dark for dinner, socializing, and, during rare moments of calm, piano concerts.

My Notorious Life: A Novel

A brilliant rendering of a scandalous historical figure, Kate Manning's My Notorious Life is an ambitious, thrilling novel introducing Axie Muldoon, a fiery heroine for the ages. Axie's story begins on the streets of 1860s New York. The impoverished child of Irish immigrants, she grows up to become one of the wealthiest and most controversial women of her day.

The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend

It all began with a correspondence between two quite different women: 28-year-old Sara from Haninge, Sweden, and 65-year-old Amy from the small town of Broken Wheel, Iowa. After years of exchanging books, letters and thoughts on the meaning of literature and life, Sara, mousy, disheveled, who has never been anywhere in her life - has really lived only for her work in a beloved bookshop, which has just closed its doors for the last time - bravely decides to accept her unknown friend's invitation to visit.

The Alice Network: A Novel

In the chaotic aftermath of World War II, American college girl Charlie St. Clair is pregnant, unmarried, and on the verge of being thrown out of her very proper family. She's also nursing a desperate hope that her beloved cousin Rose, who disappeared in Nazi-occupied France during the war, might still be alive.

The Nest

Every family has its problems. But even among the most troubled, the Plumb family stands out as spectacularly dysfunctional. Years of simmering tensions finally reach a breaking point on an unseasonably cold afternoon in New York City as Melody, Beatrice, and Jack Plumb gather to confront their charismatic and reckless older brother, Leo, freshly released from rehab. Months earlier, an inebriated Leo got behind the wheel of a car with a 19-year-old waitress as his passenger.

Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis

Hillbilly Elegy is a passionate and personal analysis of a culture in crisis - that of white working-class Americans. The decline of this group, a demographic of our country that has been slowly disintegrating over 40 years, has been reported on with growing frequency and alarm but has never before been written about as searingly from the inside. J. D. Vance tells the true story of what a social, regional, and class decline feels like when you were born with it hung around your neck.

Beartown

People say Beartown is finished. A tiny community nestled deep in the forest, it is slowly losing ground to the ever encroaching trees. But down by the lake stands an old ice rink, built generations ago by the working men who founded this town. And in that ice rink is the reason people in Beartown believe tomorrow will be better than today. Their junior ice hockey team is about to compete in the national semifinals, and they actually have a shot at winning.

Publisher's Summary

A captivating, beautiful, and stunningly accomplished debut novel - the story of a lighthouse keeper and his wife who make one devastating choice that forever changes two worlds.

In 1918, after four harrowing years on the Western Front, Tom Sherbourne returns to Australia to take a job as the lighthouse keeper on remote Janus Rock. To this isolated island, where the supply boat comes only four times a year and shore leaves are granted every other year at best, Tom brings a young, bold, and loving wife, Isabel. Three years later, after two miscarriages and one stillbirth, the grieving Isabel is tending the grave of her newly lost infant when she hears a baby’s cries on the wind. A boat has washed up on shore carrying a dead man and a living baby. Tom, whose records as a lighthouse keeper are meticulous and whose moral principles have withstood a horrific war, wants to report the dead man and the infant immediately. But Isabel has taken the tiny baby to her breast. Against Tom’s judgment, they claim the child as their own and name her Lucy, but a rift begins to grow between them. When Lucy is two, Tom and Isabel return to the mainland and are reminded that there are other people in the world…and one of them is desperate to find her lost baby.

M.L. Stedman’s extraordinarily compelling characters, still trying to make sense of life in the wake of so much death in the war, are imperfect people seeking to find their north star in a world of incomprehensible complexity.

What the Critics Say

“M.L. Stedman’s The Light Between Oceans is a beautiful novel about isolation and courage in the face of enormous loss. It gets into your heart stealthily, until you stop hoping the characters will make different choices and find you can only watch, transfixed, as every conceivable choice becomes an impossible one. I couldn’t look away from the page and then I couldn’t see it, through tears. It’s a stunning debut.” (Maile Meloy, author of Both Ways Is the Only Way I Want It)

What made the experience of listening to The Light Between Oceans the most enjoyable?

A great read. I highly recommend.

Who was your favorite character and why?

Tom was my favorite character. His perseverance and overall sense of personal responsibility is remarkable. He is the kind of person that I have always strived to be. He makes very difficult choices because of his morality,and tries to protect those around him. Most people like to believe that they are like Tom, but few are able to make the tough choices. The author writes his characters carefully, but does not reveal information until needed.

What does Noah Taylor bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

The story is set in Australia and is read by an Australian. The tone of the reader is distinctive - never too rapid, nor did it drag.

Any additional comments?

The 3 main characters have lived through very difficult times and circumstances. When a dead man and an infant show up on the island where Tom, the light keeper, and his wife Izzy live, the couple rescue the child, and bury the man. Persuaded by Izzy to keep the baby and raise her as their own, Tom is conflicted by guilt. How each person lives, loves, and make choices is the real point of the story. I could not help but be touched. <br/><br/>

I like the narration to match the book setting. In other words, a book set in England seems better when narrated by someone with an English accent. While Mr Taylor's Aussie accent was no doubt the real thing, his flat tone seems to drops at the end of every sentence, and I hit "rewind" countless times in order to understand what he was saying. The story is wonderful, but I recommend listening in a soundproof room, or else just buy the book. The narration nearly ruins it.

Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?

I will edit this review if I actually make it through the first few hours. It has been tedious straining to hear the narrator, who trials off at the end of his sentences.

Would you be willing to try another book from M. L. Stedman? Why or why not?

I would probably buy another book by this author. From what I catch of the story, it seems good. I know the book got great reviews.

How could the performance have been better?

Get a new narrator. This readers voice is completely monotone and hard to listen to.

Any additional comments?

I read the other reviews about the narration but I don't usually notice other books that have bad "performance" reviews. This one is rough. I hope as I get more involved in the story, the poor narration is less noticeable.

I listen to a lot of audio books and this is the worst narrator I have ever heard. On the long sentences his voice would either speed up and at the same time fade away. I was missing so much of what he said that I went to the library and checked out the book. It is such a shame because this is such a beautifully written story.

What did you like best about this story?

The language. It is beautifully written

How could the performance have been better?

Slow down, and don't drop off your sentences. Some of the longer sentences were so quick and quiet they turn into a total mumble!

If you could play editor, what scene or scenes would you have cut from The Light Between Oceans?

Don't cut anything. It's a well written story with beautiful language

Any additional comments?

Would like a refund, that's how bad the narration was. I couldn't even listen to it.

I"m not sure. The narration is just so abominable, I couldn't get into the story and had to stop listening. The narrator had an intensely annoying voice that fell to almost inaudible tones at the end of most sentences. As such, you couldn't hear the end of many sentences. Poor choice of narrators.

What could M. L. Stedman have done to make this a more enjoyable book for you?

Well, for starters, a strong narrator with a clear voice would have been an improvement.

As my friend put it, this was the best worst book meaning the ethical dilemma (worst) tears your heart out but it is really well written (best). Without giving away the story, the light keeper on the island of Janus, 100 miles off the western shore of Australia, is struggling between doing what is best for his wife and what is ethical. The internal turmoil he is suffering is palpable. The book made me feel heavy with conflict - but I couldn't stop listening! My only complaint is that the recording is very soft and the narrator had quite a sonorous voice which combined often made it difficult to hear/understand.

The premise of this story is very creative and I was immediately engaged. These characters find themselves in a heck of a fix. My heart was broken for all of them.

I wanted a different ending, but I don't know what it would have been. Perhaps there was no way to end it in an equitable manner. It is a tough problem that these people had to deal with.

Although I liked the narrator, he was very hard to understand at times, especially when his voice went very soft. I know he was doing that for effect, but if you can't understand what he is saying, the effect is lost anyway.

All in all, I would recommend this book. I enjoyed reading/listening to it very much.

I've just finished this excellent book this morning, and I'm still a bit lost in its spell. What a story! I cried more than once (and for more than one reason), laughed several times, actually felt sick a few times, and on more than one occasion felt myself completely taken up in it, which is the highest praise I can give a book.

I strongly recommend this book to anyone who loves a good, compelling, and deeply moving story.

The only complaint I have is that the narrator would often sort of trail off at the end of a sentence. In every other respect, he was a fine narrator. As I understand it, he's an Australian himself, so that helps lend the story some authenticity.

A lot of reviewers here have really been hard on the narrator, some going so far as to say he ruined the book for them. I did not feel it was quite that bad. I simply turned the volume up a bit higher than normal, so that when he trailed off, he was still easily audible. It did make him a bit loud at times, but I was ok with that.

The book and story are so utterly compelling, it's worth putting up with the narrator's imperfections.

What reaction did this book spark in you? Anger, sadness, disappointment?

Unbearable sadness.

Any additional comments?

Not my cup of tea! Before anyone starts sending hate mail, please understand, the book is well written, I (meaning ME, my opinion) just hated the story. In regard to the characters, I'm not sure who the protagonist or the antagonists are but I hated Tom! and Hannah! Truth be told I don't like reading any book that is so overwrought with sadness as to make ripping my own heart out and shredding it with my fingernails seem preferable, but I digress. I have five kids, so yea... I'm a Mom. I thought Hannah was selfish to demand the return of Lucy/Grace without thought for what it was putting the child through. I also thought Tom was selfish for agreeing and then, in order to quell his own guilty conscience, destroying just about everybody's lives. Something akin to confessing an affair for no other purpose than making yourself feel better. Isabel was the easiest for me to forgive, losing 3 babies and then having one appear almost magically. It would be real easy to convince yourself it was a gift from God and surely meant to be.